'Doctor Who' Missing Episodes Guide |
Doctor Who: Evolution of a Title Sequence
Doctor Who Enemies: Zygons | Doctor Who Enemies: The Sontarans
Doctor Who Enemies: The Ice Warriors | Doctor Who Enemies: Doctor Who Enemies: Silurians and Sea Devils | Doctor Who Enemies: Autons
In the 1970s, the BBC went through its archives and destroyed lots of old episodes of programmes that were considered worthless at the time. One of the programmes to suffer this was Doctor Who. For more information about this go to The Lost Episodes of Doctor Who - the TV Series. Over 100 episodes of Doctor Who were lost. Since then, some have been found still in the archives, some have been found from private collectors or abroad and a few have been recreated.
For the first six years, Doctor Who was made and broadcast in black and white. Although the show made the transition to colour in 1970, black and white film copies were still made of all of Jon Pertwee's episodes for the purpose of export to countries still broadcasting in monochrome (this practice of making duplicates ended in 1974). At the time of writing, all Doctor Who episodes exist from the Tom Baker era and onwards and all are in colour. All episodes in the Jon Pertwee era also exist; though some only survived as black-and-white film prints, they have been colourised for DVD release. However, many episodes from the William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton eras were destroyed, and have never been seen since.
Below is an episode guide for the William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton years, which shows which episodes are missing in each story.
First Doctor - William Hartnell
Season One - 1963-4
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'An Unearthly Child' (AKA '100,000 BC') | 4 | None |
| 'The Daleks' (AKA 'The Mutants' and 'The Dead Planet') | 7 | None |
| 'Inside the Spaceship' (AKA 'Edge of Destruction') | 2 | None |
| 'Marco Polo' | 7 | All |
| 'The Keys of Marinus' | 6 | None |
| 'The Aztecs' | 4 | None |
| 'The Sensorites' | 6 | None |
| 'The Reign of Terror' | 6 | 4 and 5 |
Season Two - 1964-5
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'Planet of Giants' | 3 | None |
| 'The Dalek Invasion of Earth' | 6 | None |
| 'The Rescue' | 2 | None |
| 'The Romans' | 4 | None |
| 'The Web Planet' | 6 | None |
| 'The Crusade' | 4 | 2 and 4 |
| 'The Space Museum' | 4 | None |
| 'The Chase' | 6 | None |
| 'The Time Meddler' | 4 | None |
Season Three - 1965-6
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'Galaxy Four' | 4 | 1-2 and 4 |
| 'Mission to the Unknown' | 1 | All |
| 'The Myth Makers' | 4 | All |
| 'The Daleks' Master Plan' | 12 | 1, 3-4, 6-9, 11 and 12 |
| 'The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve' | 4 | All |
| 'The Ark' | 4 | None |
| 'The Celestial Toymaker' | 4 | 1-3 |
| 'The Gunfighters' | 4 | None |
| 'The Savages' | 4 | All |
| 'The War Machines' | 4 | None |
Season Four - 1966
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'The Smugglers' | 4 | All |
| 'The Tenth Planet' | 4 | 4 |
Second Doctor - Patrick Troughton
Season Four (continued) - 1966-7
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'The Power of the Daleks' | 6 | All |
| 'The Highlanders' | 4 | All |
| 'The Underwater Menace' | 4 | 1 and 4 |
| 'The Moonbase' | 4 | 1 and 3 |
| 'The Macra Terror' | 4 | All |
| 'The Faceless Ones' | 6 | 2 and 4-6 |
| 'The Evil of the Daleks' | 7 | 1 and 3-7 |
Season Five - 1967-8
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'The Tomb of the Cybermen' | 4 | None |
| 'The Abominable Snowmen' | 6 | 1 and 3-6 |
| 'The Ice Warriors' | 6 | 2 and 3 |
| 'The Enemy of the World' | 6 | None |
| 'The Web of Fear' | 6 | 3 |
| 'Fury from the Deep' | 6 | All |
| 'The Wheel in Space' | 6 | 1,2, 4 and 5 |
Season Six - 1968-9
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Missing Episodes | | 'The Dominators' | 5 | None |
| 'The Mind Robber' | 5 | None |
| 'The Invasion' | 8 | 1 and 4 |
| 'The Krotons' | 4 | None |
| 'The Seeds of Death' | 6 | None |
| 'The Space Pirates' | 6 | 1 and 3-6 |
| 'The War Games' | 10 | None |
Third Doctor - Jon Pertwee
Although the colour versions of a number of stories from the Jon Pertwee era have been lost, all episodes have been released on DVD in colour. Three of these ('Doctor Who and the Silurians', 'Terror of the Autons' and 'The Dæmons') have been 'recoloured' by combining the remaining black-and-white film prints with colour NTSC home video copies. While the picture quality is not quite as sharp as the normal episodes, they do give a strong indication of how the programmes would have looked.
Other episodes have had colour restored by combining hand-colouring key frames and using a computer to restore the colour to the frames between these, such as on the first episode of 'The Mind of Evil'. When possible, a process known as chroma dot colour recovery, has been used, including for episodes of 'The Mind of Evil', 'Planet of the Daleks' and 'Invasion of the Dinosaurs'.
There are, however, a number of episodes that only exist as black-and-white film prints.
| Episode Title | Number of Episodes | Episodes only in Black & White | | 'The Ambassadors of Death' | 7 | 2-7 |
| 'The Mind of Evil' | 6 | All |
| 'Planet of the Daleks' | 6 | 3 |
| 'Invasion of the Dinosaurs' | 6 | 1 |
Episode Names
For most of the William Hartnell era, each episode had its own on-screen name rather than an overall story title. Below are the names of the episodes that are missing from the Hartnell era.
First Doctor - William Hartnell
'Marco Polo' - All Episodes Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'The Roof of the World' | 1 |
| 'The Singing Sands' | 2 |
| 'Five Hundred Eyes' | 3 |
| 'The Wall of Lies' | 4 |
| 'Rider from Shang-Tu' | 5 |
| 'Mighty Kublai Khan' | 6 |
| 'Assassin at Peking' | 7 |
'The Reign of Terror' - Episode 4 and 5 Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'A Tyrant of France' | 4 |
| 'A Bargain of Necessity' | 5 |
'The Crusade' - Episodes 2 and 4 Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'The Knight of Jaffa' | 2 |
| 'The War Lords' | 4 |
'Galaxy Four' - Episodes 1, 2 and 4 Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'Four Hundred Dawns' | 1 |
| 'Trap of Steel' | 2 |
| 'The Exploding Planet' | 4 |
'The Myth Makers' - All Episodes Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'Temple of Secrets' | 1 |
| 'Small Prophet, Quick Return' | 2 |
| 'Death of a Spy' | 3 |
| 'Horse of Destruction' | 4 |
'The Daleks Master Plan' - Episodes 1, 2-4, 6-9, 11 and 12 Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'The Nightmare Begins' | 1 |
| 'Devil's Planet' | 3 |
| 'The Traitors' | 4 |
| 'Coronas of the Sun' | 6 |
| 'The Feast of Steven' | 7 |
| 'Volcano' | 8 |
| 'Golden Death' | 9 |
| 'The Abandoned Planet' | 11 |
| 'The Destruction of Time' | 12 |
'The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve' - All Episodes Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'War of God' | 1 |
| 'The Sea Beggar' | 2 |
| 'Priest of Death' | 3 |
| 'Bell of Doom' | 4 |
'The Celestial Toymaker' - Episodes 1-3 Missing
| Episode Name | Episode Number | | 'The Celestial Toyroom' | 1 |
| 'The Hall of Dolls' | 2 |
| 'The Dancing Floor' | 3 |
